Slightly over one-third of the newly-elected MLAs entering the Delhi assembly have criminal cases against them. An analysis of the successful candidates shows that out of the 70 MLAs, 24 have declared criminal cases against them. Of these, 23 MLAs belong to the Aam Aadmi Party while one legislator belongs to the BJP. The BJP has only three MLAs in the assembly. Comparatively, in the previous Delhi assembly elections, 25 MLAs with criminal records were elected while in the 2008 Delhi assembly elections 29 out of 68 MLAs had declared criminal cases. The survey was carried out by the Association for Democratic Reforms.
The survey also said that 91 out of 673 candidates with criminal cases, including 60 candidates with serious criminal cases like murder, attempt to murder, crimes against women, etc, lost the polls. Of these 91 candidates, 21 belonged to the Congress while 26 candidates were from the BJP and 12 candidates from the BSP. Only one AAP candidate facing a criminal case lost the polls.
In terms of assets, 44 of the 70 MLAs are crorepatis. However, the number of crorepati MLAs in the 2013 Delhi assembly was higher. Out of the 70 MLAs in Delhi 2013 assembly elections, 51 MLAs were crorepatis and in the 2008 Delhi assembly elections, 47 out of 68 MLAs were crorepatis.
